page_title: Benjamin Ogle Tayloe
section_title: Willard Hotel lawsuit
hierarchical_section_title: Benjamin Ogle Tayloe / Later career / Willard Hotel lawsuit
caption_attribution_description: English: Engraving depicting United States President Franklin Pierce departing the Willard Hotel (14th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C.) during his inaugration in March 1853.
context_page_description: Benjamin "Ogle" Tayloe was an American businessman, bon vivant, diplomat, and influential political activist in Washington, D.C. during the first half of the 19th century. Although he never held elective office, he was a prominent Whig and influential in presidential electoral politics in the 1840s and 1850s. His home, the Tayloe House, became a salon for politically powerful people in the federal government and socially influential individuals in the United States and abroad. Tayloe was also a party in the important 1869 contract law case, Willard v. Tayloe, 75 U.S. 557.
context_section_description: Tayloe divested himself of his hotel business in 1847. He had renovated the "hotel" on Pennsylvania Avenue in 1843 and 1844. But by 1847 the structures were in disrepair and Tayloe was desperate to find a tenant who would maintain them and run the enterprise profitably. A chance encounter led to the founding of one of the most legendary hotels in the city's history. Tayloe had become engaged to Phoebe Warren, another young woman from Troy, New York. Miss Warren was traveling on the Steamer Niagara (a ship which traveled up and down the Hudson River) when she met Henry Willard, a chief steward aboard the vessel. Miss Warren was so impressed with the way Willard handled the ship's and passengers' needs that she recommended him to her fiancé. Willard visited Washington, D.C., in October 1847 to meet with Tayloe, who subsequently leased the six hotel buildings to him. Willard combined them into a single structure in 1850 and enlarged it into a four story-hotel he called the Willard Hotel. 
  Tayloe's lease to Willard later generated an important case before the Supreme Court of the United States. In 1854, Tayloe leased the property again to Willard, this time for 10 years at a rate of $1,200 per year. The lease contained a provision that Willard could purchase the entire property at any time during the life of the lease for $22,500—$2,000 in "cash" down payment and another $2,000 a year plus interest thereafter until the mortgage was paid. During the lease, the Civil War broke out and property values in Washington, D.C., skyrocketed. In 1863, Congress passed the National Banking Act, which authorized the federal government to issue United States Notes (paper money) rather than certificates redeemable in gold. On April 15, 1864, two weeks before the lease was due to expire, Willard tendered the down payment to Tayloe in paper money. Tayloe refused to issue the mortgage and turn over the deed, claiming that the hotel was now worth much more than $22,500 and that Willard had not paid in gold (the only form of cash available in 1854) as specified in the lease. Willard sued. The Supreme Court of the District of Columbia held against Willard.  Willard appealed. In 1869, the U.S. Supreme Court held that the terms of the lease should not be interpreted as of the date it was agreed to (1854). Congress had made the use of gold and silver as currency illegal during the war, and this change in the law enabled Willard to pay the down payment in paper currency. The Court also held that the terms of the lease did not provide for a re-evaluation of the worth of the hotel, and that Willard was entitled to the original $22,500 purchase price. For many years, the decision was the leading case in contract law regarding intent and enforcement.
caption: Engraving depicting the Willard Hotel in 1853.
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